Summary: The Council acted with fault in its response to Miss X’s complaint on needing to move home due to risk of domestic violence. It apologised and provided Miss X with a financial remedy to acknowledge its delays. It also improved its services to allow Council staff access to housing records to reduce the risk of perpetrators being accommodated near domestic violence survivors. The Council provided an adequate remedy before the Ombudsman investigated.

The complaint

1. Miss X says her complaint was not taken seriously and not all her concerns were answered by the Council. She says her complaints were not investigated promptly despite the risk to her and her family. And she says she found some parts of the complaint responses to be insulting and incorrect (the reference to lack of convictions and denial of the perpetrator’s proximity).
2. She says the Council failed to the consider the impact of her having to travel further away to do shopping and finding alternative routes to school. And the tangible risk and distress to her and her children.
3. She says the total financial remedy offered of £300 is insufficient for the 12 months she suffered stress and upheaval.
4. Miss X seeks to improve Council services by requesting that that perpetrators are ‘flagged’ on Council systems to prevent this scenario happening again to anyone else.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

5. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused an injustice, we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
6. If we are satisfied with a council’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(i), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

7. I have spoken to Miss X and considered the information she sent me.
8. I have considered the Council’s responses to my enquiries.
9. Miss X and the Council have had the opportunity to comment on this draft decision. I read their comments before reaching this decision.

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What I found

Legal and administrative background

10. Under the Council’s Housing Allocations Scheme, the Council has powers to give ‘Additional Preference – band 1’ urgent priority to existing council tenants at risk of domestic violence so they can transfer to a different property. The Scheme says Council tenants will be made one offer of accommodation only.
11. The Council’s corporate complaints procedure says complaints will be responded to within 20 working days at stage one. Similarly, at stage 2 of the procedure it says ‘we will reply to your complaint within 20 working days’.
12. A Multi Agency Risk Assessment Conference (MARAC) examines high risk cases with a view to assessing risk, sharing information, and deciding the most appropriate service provision for victims/survivors of domestic violence and their families. In Croydon, this service is provided by the Family Justice Centre (FJC) which is a partnership between the Council, Police and NHS.

What happened

13. Miss X is a tenant of the Council. She was transferred to a safe address in 2016 following domestic violence from her former partner. She says she was well settled in this home, as were her children, who all attended local schools.
14. In late November 2018, her former partner told her he had been moved to live in her neighbourhood by the Council. She contacted the FJC and alerted it to his new address being ‘5 minutes away’ from her home.
15. MARAC discussed the case in December 2018 and noted actions taken to ensure Miss X’s safety. It also recorded that Miss X wanted her former partner to be moved away.
16. Another referral was made to MARAC in January 2019 noting Miss X’s increasing fears as her ex-partner was still in the area. The referral form recorded she felt she had no option but to request a move out of the area due to how close her ex-partner resided.
17. Miss X’s initial complaint (under stage one of the Council’s complaints procedure) was responded to in March 2019, after a face to face meeting, by staff dealing with her case at the FJC. The response noted Miss X seeking to understand how her former partner had been moved so near to her home. It described the family living in fear, that she needed the move to be fast-tracked but was also seeking a service improvement. Miss X had asked that ‘flags’ be added to Council databases to highlight the location of domestic violence victims before accommodation is offered to perpetrators. The staff member she met with agreed this was something they could consider further. Overall, the Council’s response agreed the family were at risk at needed to be moved urgently.
18. Miss X complained to the Council in August 2019 about the lack of urgent action on her case.
19. The Council responded over 13 weeks later in late November. It apologised for the delay saying it was due to the ‘complex’ nature of the case. In short it denied the ex-partner had been accommodated ‘nearby’. It said the communication between the Council and the FJC had been poor. It confirmed the FJC had contacted the housing department, who had not provided the ex-partner’s address, but the FJC had accepted that the ex-partner was nearby.
20. In terns of Miss X’s service improvement suggestion, the Council said there was already a ‘red flag’ system in place that identified perpetrators of domestic violence. It said this was a system used in other local authorities.
21. With respect to the lack of action on moving, the Council said the delay was due to Miss X seeking a move to a certain area with lower availability of properties compared to other areas. It also wrote that she had received two offers of property, but these were found to be not suitable for her needs. It also said it could not agree to offer her a four bedroom property (one extra bedroom than she has already and was judged officially to need) due to the lack of larger properties and the risk of her being subjected to the ‘spare room subsidy’.
22. The Council agreed she needed to be moved and said it had agreed this already on the basis that her former partner knew where she lived, rather than his proximity.
23. The Council provided two remedies. One was in the form of a payment for the case and complaint handling comprising a total of £250.00. The other was a joint review with Housing and the FJC to review what happened to improve communication.
24. Miss X complained again both to the Council and to the Ombudsman. She says she was forced to wait 12 months before being moved to a suitable property. And this was only after she provided the Council with evidence as the Council initially denied that he had been moved a ‘few streets away’.
25. After Miss X complained to the Ombudsman, the Council responded directly to Miss X with a ‘Stage 2 Complaint – Follow Up’. It said her former partner’s housing provider (an external organisation) had provided it with incorrect information and had also failed to tell the Council about his address. It said it had asked the housing provider to contact her directly to apologise to her. It increased the remedy amount to £300 and wrote that it ‘appreciated this had been a distressing and upsetting time for her’. (The housing provider wrote to her, confirming the Council’s version of events and offered her a financial remedy of £30.00 to acknowledge its errors).
26. The Council says even if the housing provider had informed the Council where the perpetrator was about to be housed, this would not necessarily have revealed the risk to Miss X. It said this was because he does not have a conviction and in those cases with convicted perpetrators their victims are more apparent.
27. In its response to the Ombudsman’s enquiries, the Council has written that if it had been aware the ex-partner was a few streets away it would have moved Miss X straightaway. As well as asking his housing provider to move him.
28. The Council has also detailed the service improvements in total arising Miss X’s complaints:
• FJC staff now have direct access to the records of the single homeless system which should allow FJC staff to directly be able to check where known perpetrators are placed.
• The single homeless service flag will flag up known/suspected perpetrators to the FJC.
• High risk perpetrators are accommodated, supported and risk managed to minimise contact with survivors/victims in a pilot with another organisation.

My analysis

Complaint 1)

29. The Council already accepts errors in handling Miss X’s request to move and delays in responding to the complaints for which it offered a total remedy of £300. This appears to be a satisfactory remedy for the delay suffered by Miss X.
30. The key issue for Miss X is that the Council was unaware how close her ex-partner was living to her. But this is not due to any fault by the Council, as it was dependent on information from the external housing provider who failed to inform the Council as it should have done. As evidenced by the housing provider’s letter to Miss X.
31. If the Council had been aware at the time it says it would have arranged to move Miss X urgently. In my experience this would usually involve an offer of temporary accommodation to remove urgent risk. There is no way of knowing if Miss X would or would not have accepted. Similarly, the perpetrator may or may not have been moved urgently. I cannot reach any finding on this uncertainty.
32. It is pertinent to note the Council accepted Miss X’s need to move due to her telling it the ex-partner knew her location. This was before it was aware he was living near her but it acted on Miss X telling it that she needed to move urgently, according to the information I have seen.
33. In terms of the Council mentioning there is no legal guidance on distance limits, between a domestic violence perpetrator and a victim, this is correct. I see no fault by the Council in informing Miss X this.
34. With respect to the reference to lack of convictions, I believe the Council mentioned this to illustrate those offenders subject to multi-agency public protection arrangements are subject to rigid monitoring protocols in the way the perpetrator in this complaint is not. I do not agree with Miss X that it is ‘insulting’ of the Council to mention this and it does not represent fault.

Complaint 2)

35. I do not find the Council’s responses to be unsympathetic to Miss X’s plight although they do not make direct reference to her needing to change travel and shopping routes. I note the referrals to MARAC were done promptly, as were the other safety measures which I will not detail here to maintain confidentiality. The complaints investigators express regret for the delay where appropriate and provide remedies. There is no doubt Miss X was caused inconvenience and upheaval in having to move but this was not due to fault by the Council.

Complaint 3)

36. As stated above I do not doubt Miss X suffering stress and the upheaval of moving but I am not persuaded this arose from fault by the Council as opposed to actions by others. From the evidence I have seen the Council accepted Miss X needed to move once she told it her former partner had said he knew where she lived. And it offered more than one property to her exceeding the requirement outlined in its Allocations Policy. That it took a certain amount of time to come up with a suitable property meeting Miss X’s specific location requirements notwithstanding her urgent need to move is not unusual given the well-known shortage of family sized social housing in the South East generally and does not represent evidence of fault. The financial remedy provided by the Council is broadly in line with the Ombudsman’s guidelines for calculating a remedy for avoidable time and trouble taken to complain. In short, Miss X received an incorrect and then delayed answer under the complaints procedure to her query on why her former partner had been placed in the same area. The compensation provided acknowledges and remedies this. We cannot recommend a remedy for all the stress and upheaval Miss X has gone through as the information shows that arose due to the actions of third parties rather than the Council.

Complaint 4)

37. The Council says it has implemented some service improvements which appear to make good progress on meeting Miss X’s outcome sought. The caseworkers at the FJC will have direct access now to the supported housing website to check both referrals to supported housing and placements. Housing workers will receive refresher training from staff at the FJC. And staff from Housing will meet staff from MARAC to review how to share information. These systemic changes to improve knowledge and communication between Council departments represent a good remedy in line with the Ombudsman’s Remedies Guidance.

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Final decision

38. While I uphold the complaint for the faults identified I have completed the investigation. As the fault was already remedied satisfactorily by the Council before the Ombudsman investigated.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman